EARTHQUAKE- BURYING THE DEAD in ECUADOR : 246 died and about 2,527 people were injured. Massive Earthquake Strikes Ecuador Killing Hundreds...The government says it is the country’s worst quake in decades.

04/16/2016 09:10 pm ET

PEDERNALES, Ecuador, April 17 (Reuters) - The death toll from Ecuador’s biggest earthquake in decades soared to at least 246 on Sunday as rescuers using tractors and bare hands hunted desperately for survivors in shattered coastal towns.

The 7.8 magnitude quake struck off the Pacific coast on Saturday and was felt around the Andean nation of 16 million people, causing panic as far away as the highland capital Quito and collapsing buildings and roads in a swath of western towns.

President Rafael Correa rushed home from a trip to Italy to supervise the emergency and was due to address the nation on Sunday evening. “The immediate priority is to rescue people in the rubble,” he said on Twitter.

“Everything can be rebuilt but lives cannot be recovered and that’s what hurts the most,” Correa told state radio. Vice President Jorge Glas visited the quake zone and said 246 had died and about 2,527 people were injured. BURYING THE DEAD

Soldiers patrolled the streets in Pedernales, where some streets were entirely blocked off due to collapsed houses. Other homes were missing their upper stories.

Locals used a small tractor to remove rubble and also searched with their hands for people buried underneath. Women cried after a corpse was pulled out. Inhabitants said children were trapped.

“Everything is completely destroyed,” a resident named Katrina told TV station Ecuavisa. “The majority of the buildings have fallen and there are a lot of dead.”

Many people spent the night on the streets. Enner Munoz, 40, a teacher from Pedernales, said he was in his car when he saw wooden houses and lamp-posts collapse around him. more